


the running and the chasing

by solcadit



Series: you make me complete (solangelo) [3]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan, The Trials of Apollo - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mortal, College, Soulmates, Will add more tags as we go, bianca is from nicos first life, jason lives in the room across theirs, leo and nico are roommates, nico just wants to meet his soulmate and be happy, only the first chapter is short everything else is around 5k, percy and hazel are in his second life, yes its a multiple lives au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:06:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25355962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solcadit/pseuds/solcadit
Summary: It’s midnight on January 28 once again, and it’s Nico’s third 16th birthday within multiple different lifetimes.He is seriously starting to wonder how much exactly do the Fates despise him for him to live through so many lives but still not meet his soulmate, his supposed other half. He's already starting to get tired of that damned soulmate flower.-In which flower petals dictate whether you meet your soulmate in this lifetime.
Relationships: Calypso/Leo Valdez, Cecil Markowitz & Will Solace, Jason Grace/Piper McLean, Nico di Angelo & Leo Valdez, Nico di Angelo & Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, Nico di Angelo/Will Solace
Series: you make me complete (solangelo) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1813696
Comments: 4
Kudos: 57





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> the prompt is how flower petals dictate if you meet your soulmate in the current lifetime like the "love me, love me not" thing with roses, but here it's "meet me, meet me not". i got the prompt from r-evolve-art's list on tumblr!
> 
> this is my first chaptered fic on here and im writing the story as i juggle uni papers with it, so it might take a while but im planning on seeing this fic to the end for sure! kudos and comments and bookmarks are always well appreciated and encouraged, they always make my day :D 
> 
> to end the note,  
> hello, thanks for being here, and enjoy!

“Meet me not, meet me...” Nico di Angelo mutters under his breath, almost like a chant, as he picks off one of the petals of the “magical” lily of the valley flower he is holding. 

It’s midnight on January 28 once again, and it’s Nico’s third 16th birthday within multiple different lifetimes. He is seriously starting to wonder how much exactly do the Fates despise him for him to live through so many lives but still not meet his soulmate, his supposed other half.

If his soulmate even  _ does  _ exist.

Nico first learned about soulmates and “magical lily of the valley” flowers when he turned 16 for the first time. His mother at the time had sat him down at their dinner table in their home in Venezia Italia during the late seventeenth century and pulled out a stem of a white flower with scented bell-shaped petals from underneath the hard wooden table. Nico recognizes it as the flower he’d seen highlighted in so many paintings around their home.

Nico’s mother had told him the stories and explained the myths that humans were originally created with four arms, four legs, and a single head with two faces. However, these humans were extremely powerful and even threatened to overthrow the immortals. Fearing their power and as punishment for their pride, the king god Zeus had split these humans into two, cursing them to spend their lives in search of their other halves. But because these separate humans were in sorrow and had no care whether they died, the god Apollo took pity and fixed them so that they would look like the humans existing now.

Aphrodite, the goddess of love, also took pity on the humans and created and enchanted a special flower to guide the human in their quests to find their other halves. Aphrodite’s creation, the magical flower lily of the valley, would dictate whether or not a human could meet their soulmate in that same lifetime and would wilt as soon the human had found their soulmate.

At the time, Nico had been fascinated with the idea of finding someone who could complete him and had excitedly asked for the special flower. His mother had patted his head with a gentle laugh, given him the flower, and taught him the spell - the words that Nico would soon come to despise - which would trigger the flower’s magic.

His sister Bianca had done this just two years earlier and almost right after her 16th birthday, met a girl with auburn hair pulled back in a ponytail and bright eyes that looked like the moon on a winter night when she was out one cold evening. The same evening, Bianca’s flower had wilted in its vase in her bedroom, and she had never been brighter and happier with a friend ever since. At least, until she was given away at 18 by their father to another noble family for a political marriage and her soulmate had since then disappeared off the face of the earth for reasons no one knew.

Nico had wanted that same type of pure happiness Bianca had found upon meeting her soulmate, too, however, it looked like the Fates had other plans for him. 

Two lifetimes later, here is Nico and his seemingly never-wilting magical flower. Sixteenth birthday once again because Nico is keeping the tradition from his first life, and he’s hoping to any god out there that in this crazy life time of technology and one night stands, maybe, he will finally be able to meet his soulmate. But this time, he knows much better than to just assume that he knows how to work past the magic to get that damned “meet me” just because he’s done this probably more times than any other person would have had to. Aphrodite’s magic makes the outcome impossible to calculate.

He supposes that makes sense. Any form of love usually transcends logic and calculations.

Three-time sixteen year old Nico di Angelo sits on his bed in his high school dormitory room, holding a stupid enchanted flower while his roommate is asleep. The same type of flower stands in a vase on his roommate’s bedside table, still fresh and fragrant. 

Three white petals are on Nico’s lap, and what looks like another three remains on the stem.

His roommate’s digital clock blinks  _ 12:04  _ and Nico heaves a sign, turning back to the flower. Best to get it over with.

He shuts his eyes and whispers under his breath as he plucks off a petal one by one. “Meet me not, meet me,” 

“Meet me not,"

Nico opens his eyes and looks back down at the flower. There’s one single petal left on the stem, and his breath catches in his throat. He’s not expecting anything more, but when he can so obviously  _ see  _ that there’s only one petal left, he can’t help but hope that it’s finally going to be his last flower.

One petal falls to land on his ankle, and Nico finds that the stem is now bare. He drops the flower stem, unable to stop himself from grinning widely as he realizes.

“Meet me.”

Finally.


	2. Chapter 2

Nico remembers asking Bianca and Percy all those years ago about how exactly they realized that they finally crossed paths with their soulmates, and both of them had said some variation of “ _ you will just know it because being together feels right _ ”. Bianca’s had been platonic, Percy’s had been romantic.

Nico is 21, and he still hasn’t found his soulmate, if he were to go with their descriptions of  _ how to find out if you found your soulmate _ . So many books and theories written about soulmates, so many movies depicting meeting your soulmate and the adventures you have with them, but no one has really managed to capture the essence or has written actual tips on how to find them. It sucks. It really does, so in this 21st century lifetime, Nico has decided to go to university and take up an Italian Literature, Language and Culture degree because he realized over the lifetimes that he likes books and would like to reconnect with his Italian first lifetime. Maybe he can even write his own manual on " _ how to find your soulmate _ ".

“Yo, Neeks! I heard there’s an open party over in Connor Stoll’s apartment a few blocks off campus,” The door to his shared dorm room suddenly slams open and closed and an accented voice calls out to him. “Wanna go?”

Eyebrows raised, Nico looks over to see his roommate standing at the doorway, too tired to even nag him on not calling him Neeks. Leo Valdez has his usual crazy glint in his eyes and permanent mischievous grin playing on his lips, not very unlike Nico’s second lifetime’s unrequited crush (not soulmate), Percy Jackson. 

“Right now?” Nico heaves a sigh and reaches over to check the time on his smartphone before stretching out his sleeping limbs. It’s a little past eight on a Friday night - the second Friday night of junior year - and he should have known Leo would want to go out partying. Free Fridays and Saturdays used to be their usual party nights until Nico tried (and has been succeeding so far) giving up partying over the entirety of the spring term in sophomore year, all the other weeknights are for video games. Unless, of course, someone invites them out for dinner or to hang out. Leo has always been more sociable; Nico prefers to stay in and order delivery food while watching old movies from the 1940s on his phone and stealing Leo’s beer from their fridge.

“Yeah! I heard it from Cecil Markowitz, you know the guy, right? Moved down the hall with his friend just last term. He’s friends with Connor Stoll through a mutual friend or something.” 

With his fast way of speaking when excited and his lips constantly twitching into a cheeky grin, Nico sometimes wonders if Leo Valdez is Percy Jackson’s soul reincarnated into a different body cursed to find a different soulmate, but multiple lives theory in relation to soulmates has stated that it isn’t possible so he drops it. They still have their major differences in personality anyway (such as how Leo is a million times more annoying and loud than Percy can ever be, despite Leo being endearing sometimes) and Nico’s pretty sure he himself hasn’t changed over the lifetimes. 

Unsurprisingly, Nico has only been constantly becoming more and more pessimistic as the years pass.

Leo continues to chatter excitedly, his fingers fumbling with the cord of a pair of entangled earphones he has probably picked up from the foot of his bed, “And besides, you need a break, you know! You need to go out and have some fun! Free booze and free food at a party!”

Now, Leo has been bugging him every week and trying to get him out of their dorm room ever since Nico tried to turn over a new leaf and stop hooking up because all it did was make him feel even lonelier and more like shit because he hasn’t found his soulmate yet. But then again, Nico really hasn't drunk anything with alcohol for a while. He can always stop himself from drinking tomorrow, right?

Leo adds, “And you know Reyna’s going to be there.”

At the mention of Reyna’s name, Nico immediately shrugs and stands up from his desk, shutting his textbooks closed. It’s not like he has anything better to do. “Yeah, okay. Whatever. Just let me change into a better shirt.”

(For the record, Reyna is one of his best friends, and parties are practically the only time they see each other.)

Leo whoops and punches his arm into the air, calling out, “Wear your nice black shirt, you know, the really nice button-down! Dress up a little, maybe you’ll meet your soulmate!”

Not hearing the last part, Nico throws open the door to his (very organized and neat, if he does say so himself, his shirts are even hanging color-coded) side of their shared closet, sighing as he pulls out the exact black button-down Leo was talking about from the rack and changes his shirt. The shirt has long sleeves that he rolls up to his elbows and rips near the shoulders, exposing his collarbones. It’s usually his go-to shirt when he goes out clubbing because of how easily it attracts lone strangers to him once, quoting Leo, “ _ they decide his overall aura isn’t dark and terrifying _ ”. He decides to not change out of the worn black skinny jeans with ripped knees he’s already wearing. He wore it to class that morning and had Leo whistle at his ass ( _ “no homo, Nico” _ ) as he ran out of the room because he was already late. 

While Leo doesn’t have as amazing a fashion sense as Nico’s other friends from his second lifetime does, Leo has an okay sense of fashion despite his weird obsession with striped shirts and suspender pants. Despite that weirdness, his opinions are usually spot on so Nico usually trusts him for fashion advice. 

Although he doesn’t understand why he has to dress up in his nice black shirt. 

When Nico voices that thought out, Leo just grins wildly, shoving the earphones he’s holding into his suspender pants pocket, and says, “I have a good feeling about tonight. You  _ will  _ meet your soulmate tonight!”

As if.

“Gee, I’ve been going to college parties for two years and you think this party is where I’m going to meet my soulmate?” Nico says sarcastically as he stands in front of the mirror and tries to comb his through dark hair with his fingers. “Are you for real?”

Leo laughs from where he’s still standing near the door; Nico finds it annoying. He gives up on his hair and leaves it be, shaggy black locks falling over his eyes.

“Hey! Don’t be so pessimistic, Neeks! I met Cal at a party last week while you were ordering in Chinese takeout and drinking your sad sparkling cider. You might actually meet your soulmate today.”

Just the Saturday night before, Nico had looked up from his noodles and cider at the exact moment the magical flower taped to the wall with duct tape on Leo’s side of the room decided to  _ die _ . It was that exact moment that Nico confirmed the Fates really did hate him. Even Leo Valdez, who had spent more time yelling and complaining about how sad he was that he hadn’t found his soulmate yet than actually searching for his soulmate, had met his soulmate before Nico did. 

It just wasn’t fair.

Nico spins around on his bare heels, facing Leo with a glare. 

Leo’s smile doesn’t even waver as he starts tapping on the wall beside him, and he just waves passively. “You already look hot, I’d fuck you if I were gay, but I’m not into dudes, so- Anyway, come on, put on your shoes! We’re going to be late- Oh man, Cal’s gonna  _ kill  _ me!”

Nico rolls his eyes again as he tugs on socks and a black pair of sneakers, muttering about how a person can’t possibly be late to a party of all things and how Leo can just go die at the hands of his objectively very attractive (based on photos, Nico is still yet to meet her in person) soulmate. How Calypso - yes, that’s her real name although she prefers to be called Cal - ever had the misfortune to have short, scrawny, eternally annoying Leo Valdez as her soulmate, Nico doesn’t know; he pities her just slightly.

When both of Nico’s shoes are on and he straightens up, Leo is already halfway out the door. 

“Come on!”

Nico lets out a sigh as he follows.

Connor Stoll's apartment is huge, and it’s really more of an actual house with two connected floors than an apartment. Apparently he lives with his brother, Travis, who is currently off spending the school year in Canada or wherever. When they get there, the place is half full of dancing bodies, people making out, drinks sloshing around cups and dripping onto floors, and some new pop song is blaring on the speakers. 

It looks like a place Nico would definitely be able to find a hookup.

But he's not planning on going home with one tonight.

Colorful drinks are shoved into their hands, Leo is immediately greeted by people Nico has only seen through passing around campus but has really never talked to before, and a girl with long caramel-colored hair throws herself into Leo’s arms. Introductions are made, Nico mutters a greeting, and Calypso with her caramel hair and sleeveless white flowy dress is all smiles and twinkling eyes. Nico has to admit that she looks even better than she does in Leo’s photos, and she is extremely charming and sociable.

Predictably, the pair disappears on Nico almost immediately.

Nico finds himself sitting on the bottom of the wooden stairwell, with the constant person or pair going up or down the stairs. He’s doing his best to not get stepped on while making sure that his bright blue drink doesn’t spill. By the time he finishes his first cup, he’s barely even tipsy and is busy typing away on his phone.

Another sloshing cup is suddenly shoved in his face. "Hey, di Angelo!"

"What do you want?"

Nico looks up from his phone and finds himself eye-to-eye with a pair of piercing black eyes, hand immediately reaching out to accept the cup.

The girl in front of him straightens up and flips her long black braid over her shoulder with her free hand that’s not holding onto her own cup of alcohol. A tiny hint of a smile is on her face. 

"Didn't expect to see you here. A person would have thought you’d forgotten all about college parties."

"Fuck off, Reyna."

Despite himself trying to keep his expression neutral, Nico cannot stop his mouth from curling up at the corners. In front of him, Reyna lets out a rare laugh as she sits down on the step beside Nico, sipping from her own cup.

"But seriously, it feels like months since we last saw each other." Worry crosses her features as her eyebrows furrow just slightly. "How are you? Give me some life updates, kid."

Nico starts telling her about how he supposedly decided to turn over a new leaf, following with short stories about the things he’s been up to recently. Nico mentions his classes for the new term, the research about soulmates that he’s been doing in his free time, the annoyingly loud pop music that he keeps hearing from the dorm room directly above theirs at ungodly hours of the morning, Leo’s discovery of his very own soulmate. 

Words always come easier when it’s Reyna, with her calm and collected energy. She reacts and laughs (although rather sparingly) at all the right moments, and she’s a great listener, occasionally chiming in with her own stories. 

There was even a time a year back when they first met that Nico suspected Reyna might be his soulmate because of how well they get along with each other, only to be disappointed with the fact that his magical flower hadn’t wilted by the time Nico went back to his dorm with Leo. The next time they met, Reyna had mentioned to him that she never had a magical flower in the first place, making her one of the rare people destined to live their one single life without a soulmate. 

Nico would never let Reyna hear him say this out loud but honestly, he really envies her for not having a soulmate.

While they chat, people still constantly go up and down the stairwell they’re sitting at, squeezing in the tiny space between Reyna and the stair railing. Dirty looks are being shot in their direction but frankly, Nico doesn’t really care. He’s too immersed in Reyna’s stories about her roommate Thalia, her greyhounds Aurum and Argentum, her history lectures, and the growing collection of ancient Roman armour and weaponry Reyna’s archaeologist sister, Hylla, had managed to discover. By the time Reyna has finished explaining how exactly did Hylla manage to find the most recent addition to the collection - a military medal made of pure gold - Nico has drained his cup and is feeling pleasantly buzzed.

That is, until someone suddenly ruins the atmosphere by bumping into Reyna and dousing her and her purple shirt with the same bright blue drink Nico was drinking earlier. The liquid had slightly splashed onto Nico’s shirt as well, but it was nothing to what hit Reyna.

Reyna jumps up from where she’s sitting and holds the front of her sopping purple shirt away from her body, cursing under her breath in rapid Spanish and glaring at anyone within a five-feet radius. The culprit turns out to be a red-faced Cecil Markowitz himself - Nico recognizes him from the hallways in their dorm building - who is standing nearby speechless out of shock and clutching his cup with two hands. 

Figures, Reyna looks ready to murder. 

Cecil frantically spouts out a long list of apologies, to which Reyna just rolls her eyes and pushes through the crowd around them to go and find the nearest bathroom.

As a friend, Nico should probably go after Reyna and help her clean up, but he’s learned from experience that Reyna hates being helped during times like these. A now-deathly-pale Cecil turns onto Nico, who is still sitting expressionless where Reyna left him, and mutters another string of apologies under his breath until the girl with him drags him up the staircase.

Nico sighs and just fans out his black shirt as he waits for Reyna to come back. When a shadow appears in front of him, he doesn’t even bother looking up as he speaks. Who else at this party would approach him aside from Reyna or Leo? And Leo is probably too busy with his soulmate to even remember Nico exists.

“Let’s get out of here and talk somewhere else.”

“Um, what?”

It barely registers to Nico that the person in front of him doesn’t necessarily sound like Reyna, nor necessarily sounding like anything near female. 

“I’m ditching Leo, come on.”

Even when he stands, he’s still fumbling with his shirt and his head is looking down, his mind only slightly wondering since when did Reyna’s feet look so big. Must be the effect of that strong mixture Reyna gave him.

“Uh, sure.”

Nico stumbles past and squeezes himself through the humid cramped hallways, ducking past arms and cups until he is out the front door of Connor Stoll’s apartment.

Will Solace had seen Cecil fuck up quite a  _ lot  _ that past 24 hours.

As his roommate, Will had watched Cecil’s soulmate and longtime girlfriend Lou Ellen Blackstone storm into their dorm room at two in the morning, demanding to know “ _ what the fuck did just I hear Valentina Diaz say about you, Cecil? _ ” Frankly, Will hadn’t wanted to know any more of that either, he was just sitting at his desk and trying to memorize facts about human biology, and he’d managed to block out most of the details of whatever Lou was yelling about when Cecil the idiot, had decided to come out of the bathroom and look confused right at that moment. It only made Lou even madder.

Then later on, Will had just come out of the shower himself and Cecil had made black coffee at 9 in the morning to wake himself up. But then Cecil had proceeded to spill the freshly brewed coffee all over their fluffy white carpet that just came out of the wash two days ago,  _ then  _ spilled it all over himself and the newly bought Civil Engineering textbook he was holding when he was trying to clean the carpet. The textbook had immediately found itself pinned onto a clothesline and hanging out their window to dry, the smell of coffee filling their dorm room until Cecil had to take it down because he needed to rush to -  _ whoop de doo, Cecil, you really outdid yourself this time _ \- his Civil Engineering lecture.

And just now, right after making up with Lou Ellen at a party Cecil had forced Will to tag along with him because “ _ you study too much, Will, you should come with us to Connor Stoll’s party and have a drink. It’ll be fun. And no, we’re not talking no for an answer _ ”, Cecil had bumped into this scary-looking girl with her scary-looking boyfriend and spilled his drink all over the scary-looking girl when he had forgotten to look at where he was stepping and accidentally tripped on someone’s arm. 

Parties had never been Will’s thing in the first place and so, he had chosen to glue himself to one of the walls like some “ _ some stupid wallflower _ ”, in Cecil’s words, for the night and had silently watched the whole ordeal go down. As the crowd dispersed and Cecil and Lou Ellen ran away up to the apartment’s second floor soon after the scary-looking girl walked away, Will had walked up to the guy still sitting nonchalantly at the bottom of the stairwell, wanting to apologize for Cecil’s spilled drink.

Instead, the guy, tapping on his phone as he holds his black shirt away from his body, immediately says, _ “Let’s get out of here and talk somewhere else.” _ , told Will that  _ “he’s ditching Leo” _ , and while Will probably shouldn’t have followed him out, he didn’t think the guy would be grateful to leave and see that no one has been following him when he looks back.

So here he is, standing outside the front of the Stoll brothers’ apartment with the scary-looking guy, who he only recognizes as Leo Valdez’s roommate and has seen a few times in passing in the dorm hallways, but has never properly talked to before, standing with his back to him approximately a foot away. What was his name again? Nicholas? Nick?

The guy whips around and takes a step back in surprise, almost tripping over his own feet. He manages to catch himself, although he is still staring at Will as if wondering how he got there. 

Will’s blue eyes meet a pair of dark brown. He’s shocked to see how dark and intense the guy’s eyes are,and maybe it’s because it’s night but they’re standing out in the open air underneath one of the flickering white street lights, and the glow of the streetlights illuminates the guy’s pale face too well that he looks like he’s glowing. The darkness of his eyes contrast astoundingly against pale olive skin, eyebrows disappearing behind messy locks of shiny raven hair. 

“You’re not Reyna.” The guy's voice is rough, almost like a growl. 

Will presumes that Reyna is the name of the scary-looking girl from earlier. He smiles, rather awkwardly, and puts his hands in the front pockets of his jeans, “Nope, I am most definitely not. Though I would have thought you would have been able to recognize your own girlfriend.”

The guy blinks, briefly shaking his head as if he misheard. His dark fringe bounces from side to side. Surprise is too evident in his voice, and he coughs into the back of his pale hand.

“My  _ what _ ?”

Will cocks his head to the side, slowly realizing that he might have misunderstood something. “The girl you were with?”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

Going past the original surprise, the guy's voice isn't as similar to a growl as Will thought. His voice is more deep and soft, like velvet, and his voice has an amused tilt to it, as well. It doesn't match his dark, brooding image.

But at the same time, his voice suits his image so well. It suddenly makes so much sense for him to have a voice like velvet.

Will abruptly coughs, lowering his head in embarrassment as his cheeks color. “Oh.”

Now, this is awkward.

"I'm Will." Will suddenly blurts out to save his face, holding his hand out for a handshake before the guy can turn around and walk back in the apartment. For some strange reason, he's drawn to this guy. "I'm Cecil's roommate."

The guy's eyebrows furrow, "Cecil? Oh. The guy who told Leo about this party. Yes, I see." He nods and shakes Will's hand, albeit only for a second, before he snatches it back. 

The guy's dark eyes flicker up to meet Will's once again before he speaks and turns away. 

"I'm Nico di Angelo. I'm with Leo."

Is that an Italian accent?

Will is still standing frozen, his hand out. It was strange. Nico's hand was so cold, almost like ice, but that brief touch had sent bolts of electricity racing up and down Will’s spine. Will doesn't think it’s even possible to touch a living human hand with that low of a natural temperature and still feel electricity. 

But then the pre-med student part of his mind shifts his focus back on the temperature of Nico di Angelo’s hand, and he clears his throat. "Are you, uh, okay? See, I thought your hand was pretty cold and was wondering-"

Nico barely turns his body when he glances back, but Will doesn't miss the tiny upturn of Nico's lips and the brief amused twinkle in those dark eyes.  _ His eyes really are intense, they're like miniature black holes you can get so easily sucked into.  _

"The weather is a little chilly for this time of the year, but it's fine. All normal."

Will’s hand drops back to his side as he stares at the back of Nico di Angelo’s head, his mind whirring a thousand thoughts a second that he doesn’t know where to begin.

Nico di Angelo, more or less half a foot shorter than him, dark eyes, equally dark hair, pale olive skin, velvet voice, black clothes, cold hands. Leo Valdez’s roommate. Not the boyfriend of the scary-looking girl from earlier. Looks sort of intimidating despite rather short stature. Probably doesn’t talk much, but it only adds to his strange, magnetic charm.

He’s not Will’s type, but he finds Nico so very strangely charming.

Then again, Will doesn’t even  _ know  _ what his type is, or if he has one.

“Hey, di Angelo! Where the fuck did you run off to?”

A deep female voice yells out into the night, and Nico turns back to Will’s direction, in the direction of Connor Stoll’s apartment.

Will immediately averts his eyes and pretends he’s kicking at some pebbles on the ground with his sneaker, suddenly feeling conscious of the fact that he has been staring at Nico di Angelo for the whole of the past few minutes trying to figure out what is it with him that makes Will practically unable to take his eyes off of him.

The scary-looking girl from earlier - Reyna, did Nico say? - stomps out, long braided hair and purple shirt looking damper than earlier. In his peripheral vision, Will can see Nico calmly walk up to her, hands shoved in pockets, as Reyna starts yelling at him about “ _ how can you just disappear like that? _ ” 

Nico only laughs, a deep laugh that comes from the back of his throat. He doesn’t seem like he’s taking her seriously, and Will pretends he’s not listening to what they’re saying.

“Sorry, Reyna, whatever shit you gave me made me a bit too tipsy so I ran out with this guy-” Nico is probably motioning to him, “-because he came up to me and I thought he was you.”

The girl, Reyna, sounds like she’s in disbelief, like she thinks Nico is stupid. “And you didn’t bother to look at his face? Or even his  _ shadow _ ?” 

Nico passively waves at her, “Only you would walk up to me in this crowd, Reyna.”

Will looks back up and back and forth at the pair like he’s watching some tennis match and decides that he should probably go back inside and look for Cecil and Lou instead. He wants to go back to the dorm and finish memorizing his medical terminologies, but Cecil has the only key. 

He doesn’t even know Nico and Reyna all that well, so they probably wouldn’t notice nor care if he just left-

“Hey, Blondie,” The girl suddenly calls out to Will, and Will jerks back in surprise, a hand immediately flying to his blond hair, as he’s trying to soundlessly take a step forward to go around them. Nico’s eyes are twinkling with amusement again, and blood rushes to Will’s face. Reyna tilts her head at him. Her hair and eyes look just as dark as Nico’s, the only difference is that her eyes are looking more questioning than amused, “Why’d you follow di Angelo?”

“I, uh, I wanted to apologize for my friend. My friend, Cecil, who spilled his drink all over you and splashed onto him,” Will stutters, jerking back into his previous standing position and eyes looking down at his feet again. His words come out in a rush, “I’m sorry about him, and I apologize to the both of you in his stead. He’s sort of an idiot on most days, and he was especially clumsy today out of all days like he spilled coffee all over our carpet and his book, and he got into a stupid fight with his girlfriend then dragged us all out to this party and I’m sorry if he bumped into you and made you mad-”

Will stops his rambling when he looks up and notices how Reyna and Nico have both burst into quiet laughter. Nico’s hands are covering his face, but Will notices the deep crinkles by his eyes and Will thinks he suddenly can’t breathe for a second there.

“Uh.”

Reyna takes a few seconds to calm down from where she’s laughing and holding onto Nico’s shoulder, “It’s a party. This type of thing happens all the time. I’ll just throw this shirt in the wash later.”

“Right.” Will says, quite lamely. 

Reyna has started slapping Nico di Angelo on the back to keep him from dying from laughter, and Nico stumbles forward, shooting daggers at Reyna with his stare. 

Will should really go. This is sort of awkward. Will’s not even that funny.

“I, uh, I’ll go now. See you guys around, maybe...?”

And without waiting for a response from the pair, Will takes off back into the apartment to find Cecil and Lou Ellen. 

(Will should really make more copies of their key.) 

Cecil and Lou Ellen are sucking off each other’s faces in the middle of the second floor hallway, people having to step around them to get by.

_ Gross. _

Will heaves a giant sigh. There’s a reason he crashes in Austin’s dorm when Lou Ellen and Cecil are together. They have no sense of shame whatsoever and are absolutely clingy, whether drunk or sober. Cecil and Lou Ellen have increasingly become more inseparable ever since their first conversation at twelve years old; Will feeling more and more like a third wheel as years pass. Will briefly wonders if that’s what it's like to have met and have known who your destined other half is ever since they were in the middle of puberty, but he hopes that no one should  _ ever _ go through the same awkward situations he's been through. This exact moment being considered as an extremely awkward situation, even for Will, who has been around them for almost ten years. 

Will probably needs more friends to hang out with on a daily basis. Preferably those without soulmates or romantic partners.

But Will really does want to go home, so he squares his shoulders, clenches his teeth - standard procedure for approaching a couple in the middle of a makeout session - and strides over to the pair and taps (rather roughly, if he says so himself) on Cecil’s shoulder. Cecil groans into their kiss as he pulls away, glaring at Will as he glances around, one hand unwrapping around Lou Ellen to reach into his pocket. 

Cecil had jokingly told him _ "I'm sick of seeing your wonderful and blindingly beautiful face every day _ ." to which Will rolled his eyes and led to Will and Cecil making a deal before going to Connor's party that Will should only disturb him if and only if he wanted to go home. Cecil would give him their only key then.

So here he is.

While Cecil is rummaging in his back pocket for the key ( _ seriously, how much stuff can one pocket carry? _ ) _ , _ Lou Ellen whines and latches onto Cecil’s collarbone. Will has to stop himself from pretending to gag - also another standard reaction when having approached a couple in the middle of a makeout session.

“Here!” Cecil finally digs out their tiny dorm room key from of his back pocket and shoves it in Will's outstretched hand. "Now, go away."

Will mutters a “ _ thanks _ ” to Cecil’s back before turning away and jogging down the stairwell, fishing his phone out of his pocket as he reaches the bottom. The time is at around half past ten, and it’s probably way too early for party-lovers to leave, but parties have never been Will’ scene, so he goes straight back out of the apartment, stepping around a familiar pair of people. 

As he steps by them, Will notices how Nico is leaning against Reyna’s shoulder, with her arm wrapped tight around him. He briefly wonders if Nico had lied about them not dating. They  _ definitely  _ looked closer than just friends.

But Will shrugs the thought away and jogs down the sidewalk, back to their dorm building. Why is he even bothered by it, right? Nico is technically a stranger.

When he lets himself in his and Cecil’s dorm room, he lies down spread-eagled on his bed, phone tossed to the side. All thoughts of memorizing medical terms are gone from his brain and, for some reason, replaced with constant thoughts of Nico di Angelo. Even if Will doesn’t know what exactly it is about Nico that keeps him hooked (if that’s even the right word for it), the image of Nico’s tiny smile and his hair falling over his eyes is stuck in his head. 

He’s never had these kinds of thoughts regarding any person plague his brain this much before. 

But what Will forgets to note is the possibility of having found his soulmate in Nico di Angelo. 

Will has never really understood the supposedly beautiful and addicting charm in meeting your destined soulmate, the person who is said to “complete” you, and spending your whole life attached at the hip to that single person. He’s never really been that interested in dating, being confused at how everyone falls over themselves trying to get into a relationship or finding their soulmate. He prefers to do what he likes, and that includes saving people through being a doctor. 

Will doesn’t think to check the second drawer of the desk beside his bed, where his magical flower has been kept safely ever since Will first chanted “meet me, meet me not” to it at the young age of seven and realized that he would be meeting his soulmate in this lifetime, to see the wilted flower lying in the middle of the empty wooden drawer. 

Upon dragging a wasted-and-passed-out-cold Leo to their dorm room at approximately three in the morning, Nico di Angelo has a splitting headache and is dead tired.

Too tired to notice that the magical flower sitting in its pristine white china vase that he has been waiting to wilt for the past few lifetimes, has finally wilted. It’s been more than three hundred years.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im SO sorry it took more than a month for this and this is unbetaed, too, but yeah. i hope its alright

When Will wakes up to his usual daily alarm at seven in the morning, Cecil isn’t around, so he must have crashed over at Lou Ellen’s. 

Will grabs a piece of plain bread and munches down on it as he makes his morning coffee, then sits himself down on his bed with a steaming mug, looking over at the tiny television they have constantly tottering over their refrigerator. Not the best place to put a television, but it’s all the space they got, with Cecil’s tools and papers and Will’s notes and books. He stares blankly at the black screen, sipping at his black coffee. The bitterness makes him gag but he swallows it down either way; it does its job of waking him up very well.

But along with each sip, more and more memories of the previous night - of the party and of the strange pair he met - flood into his brain. 

He thinks about Reyna and Nico’s supposed friendship, and how it makes him feel weird inside. He thinks about Nico di Angelo’s dark eyes and dark hair, the tiny upturn of his lips, his velvety voice that Will can’t seem to forget despite the few words Nico had spoken the whole night. He vaguely remembers trying to figure out all his thoughts just the night before as well, but he still doesn’t know what about Nico di Angelo it is that keeps him constantly thinking. 

This morning, he still feels funny every time the image of Nico di Angelo’s undeniably charming smirk barges into his head, but Will shakes his head and reasons that it’s just because of this bitter coffee he’s drinking. 

Will Solace drains the mug, stands up and sets it down in the sink to wash later. He stretches his arms over his head and shakes his limbs awake, ready to start the day.

No distractions allowed. That means no unnecessary thinking of the previous night’s events.

It is a Saturday, maybe noon, seeing how high the sun is, when Leo Valdez rolls off his bed with a loud thud, a groan of pain, and a complaint. All when the room is spinning because of his hangover.

“What the  _ fuck _ , man? The whole hall heard you scream like a little girl.”

On a normal day, Nico di Angelo would promptly ignore Leo and maybe tell him to fuck off, but today is definitely not just another day. Nico turns to Leo, face paler than usual and eyes wide like saucers, and shakingly points towards his study desk. “Look!”

Leo groans, squinting and holding onto his head because of the bright sunlight streaming in their tiny-ass dorm room as he pulls himself off the wooden floor and throws his heavy comforter back on his bed. Rolling his eyes, Leo grumbles something about Nico probably just being just as hungover as he is. Then he looks over at where Nico is pointing, but not before noticing how Nico’s face is dripping wet with water. Leo raises his eyebrows, what was Nico  _ doing _ ?

Nico is pointing at a dead white flower sitting in the white vase on his own desk. Upon seeing the sad-looking, wilted flower in place of Nico’s usually bright and perfectly healthy lily-of-the-valley, Leo’s eyes widen, any form of sleepiness having disappeared in a snap and splitting headache momentarily forgotten. But his voice sounds weird, “No  _ fucking  _ way.”

Nico, from where’s standing by his desk, and Leo, from where he’s sitting on the floor, stare at each other for a second, both equally speechless and eyes wide. This is when a rapt knock suddenly comes on the door and Leo jumps up to answer the door. One of their dorm neighbors must have heard Nico’s high-pitched scream.

When Leo throws open the door, outside stands Jason Grace, the popular basketball jock who lives in the single dorm room ( _ that lucky piece of shit _ ) right across theirs. Leo unfortunately hasn’t talked much yet with Jason Grace, but they always see each other in passing, and at dinner, and on campus, and Jason has always recognized him, smiled and waved.

Thin golden spectacles are perched on top of Jason’s nose, and he peers down curiously at Leo. (He never felt  _ this  _ short when he was with Nico and Cal. To hell with basketball players and their obnoxiously tall heights.) 

“Hello? Are you alright? I was just going out of my dorm and well, that scream was a bit loud. I thought I’d check in.”

Leo looks back at Nico, who is still blankly staring at the chipping wallpaper of their room. Leo would find it funny if only Nico didn’t look like he was having a mental breakdown. As much as Leo wants to laugh at Nico and befriend this guy because they’ve been running into each other for the past three years with no interactions outside of smiles and waves, he should probably get Jason to leave as soon as possible first and get back to Nico.

Leo puts on his best, most convincing chipper smile, tries (and probably) fails to pat down his wild curly bedhead, and turns back to Jason Grace.  “Yup! We’re absolutely peachy, there’s nothing to worry about! Me and my roommate are perfectly fine, you can go along on your way now!”

Jason laughs, covering his mouth with his hand. “If you say so, I’ll get going then. Say hi to your roommate for me!”

Leo nods and smiles and waves and tells Jason “ _ thanks for stopping by _ ” until Jason disappears down the hall. He shuts the door and turns back to Nico, who has now seemed to unfreeze from where he’s standing and is poking lightly at the wilted flower in disbelief.

But first, he can feel something disgusting rising in his throat and he runs to the bathroom to throw up. He pukes his guts out on his knees in front of the toilet.

Nico looks up at him when Leo comes back, expression and voice equally expressing his intense shock, “You have to  _ talk  _ to your soulmate for it to wilt, right? It won’t wilt if you just walk by them or something?”

“Uh,” Leo squints into nothing as he racks his brain for whatever piece of soulmate theory he remembers. If he says something and it turns out to be wrong, Nico might murder him and shove his dead body in a sack until he decomposes and have Calypso bury him in her garden as plant fertilizer, and Leo doesn’t want that. “Well, I’m pretty sure one of you has to say at least one thing for it to wilt, but shouldn’t you already know that? You being a soulmate theory master or whatever.” 

Leo scratches his arm and only then realizes how shitty he still feels and probably smells.  _ Gods, he should take a shower, how did he face a neighbor like this _ ? Not that anyone would care, they’re all college students, anyway. Hangovers are probably a usual occurrence already, and people shouldn’t be judgmental.

Nico’s eyes glint from the reflection of the sunlight before looking back down at the wilted flower, gently probing at the petals as if they might suddenly revive themselves. Leo internally sighs in relief; he seems to have given a satisfactory answer. 

“I didn’t really talk to much people yesterday. I was mostly sitting with Reyna.” Nico finally says after a few long moments of complete silence. “Talked to Jason Grace for a bit, though. He’s Reyna’s friend. Some blond guy called Will. A few others”

“But you got an idea who your soulmate is?”

Leo watches Nico’s forehead scrunch up in concentration for around five seconds before his lips curl down in a deep frown and he sighs. “Only an idea. I’m not so sure. They all felt like normal conversations. A bit awkward, I guess, but nothing spectacular or mind blowing or whatever.”

“Well! Congrats on finally meeting your soulmate,” Leo starts slowly, reaching over to carefully pat Nico on the back, “but I feel like shit and I’m dehydrated, and you’re standing in front of our already tiny fridge.”

Nico is probably rolling his eyes as he says, “That’s what you get for drinking too much.” But he ducks down to open the fridge and get a bottle of Gatorade for Leo, anyway.

Leo just grins, "It was a celebration for me finding my soulmate. Cal drank just a tiny bit less than I did, you know. You know how we ended up when we first met."

Nico rolls his eyes at Leo’s wagging eyebrows.

It’s around four in the afternoon when someone - that must be Cecil - bangs on the door, yelling Will’s name and something else that’s incoherent. It’s only when Will stands up from his desk and his books that he realized he hasn’t eaten anything solid since that piece of bread that morning.

Will opens the door and Cecil grumbles about how they need copies of their key as he trudges past Will and throws himself down on his bed. Cecil calls out in a muffled voice something incoherent but Will hears the words “ _ looking for you _ ”, “ _ outside _ ”, and “ _ hallway _ ”. (Not in that particular order.) Will sticks his head out of the doorway and looks around, spotting a certain raven-haired boy dressed in all black standing a few doors away.

Nico di Angelo.

Nico’s eyes widen comically as soon as Will turns his head in his general direction, immediately dropping his gaze to the floor. His fingers are furiously tapping on the wall beside him and Will can only imagine how that must sound like for whoever is living behind that door. 

Is Nico the one Cecil had mentioned? He’s not sure but nevertheless, Will puts a smile on his face and says, “Hey there.”

Nico very obviously flinches, peeking up at Will through his dark fringe. He’s ditched the black button up shirt and jeans and went for an oversized black tee and black shorts today. His general vibe feels much less intense and charming, but it’s still charming enough to keep Will staring at him for probably longer than necessary. He wonders why it’s like that, when Will doesn’t really feel any attraction to him.

The brief thought that Nico is so aesthetically attractive to his eyes crosses his mind, but he forgets it almost immediately.

“Hi.” Nico finally says, voice soft but Will hears it clear as day in the eerie silence of the hallway, then proceeds to drop his gaze once more. 

Will thinks Nico might have something else to say, but he can’t really be sure. Also, the distance in between them is a little awkward because they could have a proper conversation without five meters in between them and with Will actually standing outside their room’s doorway, but he doesn’t want to step forward, as well.

It is so strange.

Nico clears his throat, breaking the awkward atmosphere once again. “So, uh, I think you’re my soulmate.”

Nico had imagined the first time he would talk to his soulmate to be life changing, to be unforgettable, to be absolutely  _ amazing _ . But when he went over to Will Solace and they had a short talk and exchanged numbers and all, to put it nicely, it was just plain awkward. 

He doesn’t think it’s  _ supposed  _ to be awkward.  _ Fuck _ .

What had gone wrong?

Nico had decided to take a chance and start from the person who he had some different feelings towards during their conversation the night before. He had said, _ “Hi, so, uh, I think you’re my soulmate” _ , and did it like a fucking  _ idiot _ , while being stuck to the outside of Room Number 417 instead of walking to Room Number 420 and having a proper conversation instead of one that had a few doors worth of distance in between them. 

_ Sure _ , maybe the way he started the whole conversation was really awkward, but he was still trying to organize his thoughts and plan out exactly what he was going to say before he’d say anything. But then Cecil Markowitz had come around and asked him what he was standing there for, and Nico had stammered out that he was wanting to talk to Will Solace. And Will Solace himself had stuck his messy blond head out of Room Number 420 ten seconds later, and just  _ stared  _ at Nico. Way to make Nico even more nervous than he already was.

Will’s eyes had gone round in shock before seeming to suddenly realize that they were talking the way they were in the middle of a hallway - albeit empty, but a hallway, nonetheless. He had then proceeded to invite Nico inside their dorm room so they could have a more proper conversation.

Will had immediately run into their room and had thrown open one of his bedside desk drawers. When Nico had closed the door behind them, Will was standing there with a wilted flower in his hand and staring incredulously at Nico, looking to and from the flower to Nico’s face as if he couldn’t believe it.

They had stood there staring at each other for one whole minute, Will at his desk and Nico at the door. They only snapped out of the awkward atmosphere when Will’s roommate, Cecil, had suddenly stood up from his bed and padded into the bathroom right beside Nico.

Will had chuckled awkwardly, immediately scratching at the back of his neck. “Soulmates do exist, huh. I didn’t expect myself to actually have one.”

Then he set down the wilted flower and scratched his cheek, looking at Nico, an unreadable expression on his face. He gestures back at his cluttered study desk. Nico glances over. Books are scattered all over it; Will must have been studying before he went out.

“I, uh, I was actually going to look for something to eat. I was studying the whole day, see? And uh, if you wanted to join me for a late lunch or early dinner or whatever, you’re welcome to-”

While Will was talking, Nico had just kept thinking.,  _ Is this really how it’s supposed to be? Is there no literal sparks, no talking as if they’ve known each other forever? Is it really supposed to be this awkward? _

He had waited three lifetimes to reach this exact situation he is in, and it turned out to be nothing like he expected - and definitely not in a good way. He doesn’t know what to do, and he doesn’t know what to think. Maybe he thought of the wrong person? Maybe Will isn’t  _ actually  _ his soulmate? Maybe this was all a mistake?

All he wants now is to leave, and maybe reconsider and think through everything for a second time. And so, Nico had just told Will, already turning back to the door with his hand on the knob, “I actually just took some time out of my research to talk to you, and uh, I should probably get back to it.”

Will had blinked, probably tried for a smile that unfortunately ended up looking like a grimace, and nodded.

“Alright, then. Do you want to at least exchange numbers?”

“Yeah, sure.” Nico had immediately whipped out his phone and entered the number Will had rattled off into his contacts. “I’ll text you if I’m free, I guess?”

“Oka-”

Without waiting for a proper reply, Nico had opened the door and bolted.

Jason Grace, Reyna’s friend and the younger brother of Reyna’s roommate Thalia Grace. Tall, blond, blue eyes, scar on his lip. Looked like a typical arrogant jock, but actually had substance. Majoring in Chemistry. Has an interest in psychology. Took part in Nico’s general complaining session about how difficult and unreasonable professors are.

Piper McLean. Jason’s girlfriend despite them not being soulmates. Loosely braided chocolate brown hair. Deep brown eyes. Interesting to talk to because of her many stories about how she’d apparently asked people to do stupid shit and they actually did it. How did she do it?

A guy called Clovis. Blond, stocky, seemed like he's somewhere between asleep and awake. Talked with Nico after Reyna left about lucid dreams and time travel - that kind of philosophical stuff. Nico had fun talking to him to the extent that he didn’t notice how much time passed by.

Could one of these three people be his soulmate instead of Will?

Nico lies on his bed, blankly staring at the ceiling as he continuously thinks and thinks about this whole confusing situation. It’s really so different from all his expectations and imaginations.

He’d thought he would meet his soulmate and be able to confirm who that person was the moment his soulmate opened their mouth. Will Solace, albeit charming in his own clumsy way, isn’t really the person Nico thought his soulmate would be. He always expected his soulmate to be just as enthusiastic to find their soulmate as he was, and well, Will didn’t seem the least bit curious nor interested in the idea of being someone’s other half.

Sure, Will had been constantly staring at him like Nico was someone from his past that he lost and never thought he’d meet again. But Nico always expected his first meeting with his soulmate would be something akin to a revelation where figurative sparks would fly and figurative fireworks would be exploding in the background. Not the radio silence with screechy, annoying feedback that came after Will saying that he never expected himself to actually  _ have  _ a  _ fucking soulmate _ .

What did the Fates have against him?

When the sun has fully set and it is almost pitch black outside their windows, Nico sighs and grabs at his phone, which is lying right beside his arm. It’s nearing seven o’clock; Nico has been lying on his bed for around more than two hours now. He drags himself to sit up and heaves another sigh as he runs a hand through his hair. Leo went out the same time he did to go and bother his soulmate, assuming that she’s already up, and had made Nico promise that they were going to get dinner together at the old-fashioned diner a street away from the dorm building at seven o’clock sharp. 

Leo had said,  _ “I’m locking you out of our room if you’re late! _ ”

Nico had just snorted. They both know very well that Nico is never late, and that Leo never follows up on his threats, anyway. He’s all bark and no bite, and besides, Leo left his own key on his desk.

Heaving a sigh, Nico jumps off his bed and walks over to his closet. It’s the end of September, he can’t just go out wearing shorts in the evening, so he changes into a pair of jeans that has been thrown to the back of his closet after smoothening out the pair. Then he pulls out a black bomber jacket off the clothes hanger and shrugs it on, pulling on a pair of slip-on sneakers just as the clock ticks 18:50. 

Nico’s head is spinning with thousands of thoughts as he locks their dorm room behind him, so he barely notices the person he walks into when he reaches the elevator.

“Sorry,” Nico mutters as he pulls out his phone to check the time, his free hand out to press the  _ down  _ button on the elevator pad. Exactly one minute has passed since he previously checked the time.

“It’s alright.”

Nico drops his phone face-down on the floor, and immediately crouches down to pick it back up. The person laughs - yes, Nico is intentionally not looking at his face, although the voice and the laugh is already enough to give away his identity: Will - and leans down to scoop up Nico’s phone with a single hand before Nico can even lay a finger on it.

“Here.” Will hands him the phone, face-down. There’s a smile on his face.

Nico immediately reaches for it, flipping it over to see a new crack at the bottom right corner of his screen protector. “ _ Fuck. _ ” Then he peeks up at Will through his bangs before looking back down and muttering as he shoves his phone back in his jacket pocket, “Thanks.”

“So, where are you going?” Will conversationally asks. 

Nico almost doesn’t manage to stop himself from closing his eyes and mumbling a prayer to whichever god of coincidences had made him leave his and Leo’s dorm room at the exact moment Will Solace was waiting at the elevator. In another lifetime, he would probably be ecstatic to have met his soulmate to be having a relatively okay conversation, but not this one. Just a few hours ago, Will had been absolutely awkward and surprised - was that even surprise? - to find out that Nico was most likely his soulmate, and now, he’s trying to chat Nico up as if nothing even happened? 

Gods, can’t this fucking elevator arrive already?

Nico takes a deep breath before saying, “Dinner with Leo and Cal.”

Then he makes the mistake of looking up at Will. (Is Will really tall or is Nico just  _ that  _ vertically challenged?) Will has startlingly bright blue eyes the color of a clear cloudless sky, and his curly hair is glinting golden under the ugly yellow light of the dorm hallways.

Maybe, just  _ maybe _ , Nico stares at Will, abruptly noticing the spray of dark freckles peppering Will’s nose and cheeks, and how Will’s smile is big and bright like the fucking sun. Nico stares, and it feels like Will is moving in slow motion when his smiley expression changes into a vaguely surprised and worried one.

“You haven’t eaten yet? You should go and-”

For some reason, that snaps Nico out of his staring session, and he almost rolls his eyes. “Yes, Will, it’s why I’m here right now. I’m going to grab  _ dinner _ .”

“Ah, right.” Will looks embarrassed, his ears suddenly glowing red. “Well, uhm, I also just want to apologize for earlier. I don’t usually check on my soulmate flower because I never really understood what they were for, so-” 

Nico’s eyebrows disappear into his fringe, and he pretends he doesn’t notice how Will’s eyes anxiously flicker from Nico’s face to the number on the elevator button pad as if he knows he accidentally said something wrong. The elevator has been stuck on the ninth floor for the past few minutes now, what the  _ fuck _ ? Can’t it do both Nico and Will a favor and arrive on the fourth fucking floor already?

Will hastily corrects his previous statement as he focuses his gaze back on Nico, who is now staring at the elevator number pad, as if threatening the elevator to reach their floor already. In his peripheral vision, Nico sees the reddish tint spreading from Will’s ears to his tan cheeks as Will continues speaking, his words rushing out.

“Not that I never wanted a soulmate! It’s just, I never really saw the charm in meeting your supposed destined other half and spending the rest of your life with them, but I’m not against soulmates or anything! I’m sure you’re an amazing person and it would objectively be great to spend all my time and the rest of my life with you, and that it’s great to be your soulmate! But, I just don’t think I’ve ever been interested in dating because I’ve been wanting to be a doctor to help save people all my life and I never really saw myself doing anything aside from that. All the people I know who found their soulmates are all dating their soulmates, and I was never interested in romantic relationships.”

The elevator has now reached the eighth floor. 

Nico tears his gaze away from the pad and looks back at Will, “I see.”

Will’s face is still bright red, and his eyebrows are furrowed with some emotion Nico can’t really guess. “Look, I’m really sorry-”

“Soulmates don’t necessarily have to be romantically involved, you know.” Nico cuts in Will’s apology.

Will promptly shuts up upon seeing Nico's stone-like expression, and the elevator doors open with a ding. The tiny elevator is empty and Nico takes the first step in, still speaking. Will follows him dutifully and presses a button to close the doors.

Nico shoves his hands in the pockets of his aviator jacket and intentionally ignores Will’s gaze, looking forward as he continues speaking. The elevator reaches the ground floor with a clunk and another ding just as Nico finishes his statement.

“Who ever said soulmates have to date? Platonic soulmates do exist.”

As Nico strides out of the elevator and in the direction of the building doors, he takes a quick glance back in Will’s direction. Will is frozen inside the elevator, and has only unfrozen to rush out when the elevator attempts to close itself on him and go up the building again. 

Nico is out of the building with approximately five minutes to spare before the clock strikes another hour. 

The strong autumn night wind blows at Nico's face and whistles in his ears, and he doesn’t hear Will call out to his back, “Let’s be friends, Nico! I’ll text you!”

Cecil had apparently heard Will’s conversation with Nico from that afternoon and had spent the next few hours talking about the many ways that their conversation could have gone down a better route. Cecil had even gone down to the dormitory cafeteria with him just so he could continue lecturing Will on “ _ how to properly treat a soulmate without possibly offending them _ .”

Will had actually just stepped out of their dorm room to go get a granola bar from the vending machine on the other corner of the hallway because he needed a break from Cecil’s lecture, when he had bumped into Nico di Angelo himself by the elevators.

Of course it was Nico.

When Nico had walked out of the building, Will was unsure whether Nico had still managed to hear what Will had yelled out about being friends with him. So with a rather heavy heart, Will went back in the elevator that was still waiting for him and returned to the fourth floor. He doesn’t get his granola anymore, and just heads straight to their room.

Cecil is lying on his bed and tapping on his phone when Will comes back. Cecil shifts his body to look at him, eyebrows raised.

“Did you really take that long just to come back without your damned granola bar? What, did you go on every floor to find the vending machines empty or-”

“I met Nico.”

“Oh.” Cecil pauses for a second before groaning. “Please don’t tell me you said something to offend the dude  _ again _ .”

A frown makes its way on Will’s lips. Nico  _ had  _ sounded a bit vicious and biting with his last statement about platonic soulmates existing. A bit bitter, a bit hurt maybe. Cecil rolls himself up to a seating position on his bed and, upon seeing Will’s expression, groans even louder.

Cecil crawls over to hang his feet off the edge of his bed, patting the empty space beside him. “Come on, Will. Come sit next to Uncle Cecil.”

Will rolls his eyes at the nickname Cecil had been using for himself whenever any one of them needed advice or a space to vent their feelings, but he sits down on Cecil’s bed and launches into a (very) detailed summary of what happened between him and Nico just minutes ago. 

Cecil is a good listener, always has been. He only speaks after Will is done retelling the events that transpired earlier, and even then, they’re all mostly questions about Nico’s expressions and tone of voice. Honestly, if Cecil wasn’t a Civil Engineering major, he’d probably make a really good psychologist or guidance counselor.

“Okay, look here, Will.” Cecil claps his hand lightly, sounding like he’s finally decided on what advice or tip to tell Will. “You just heard about him possibly being your soulmate a few hours before you interacted  _ again _ . Like I said earlier, even if it was unintentional, the stuff you said to him about being surprised you actually have a soulmate probably really left a mark on him. A wound that had barely started to heal.”

Cecil pauses for effect before continuing, his hands waving around as he attempts to get his point across.

“And then you try to clear it up and say that you never really see the charm of finding your soulmate and spending the rest of your life with them,” Cecil gives him a withering look that makes Will feel ashamed. “That’s harsh and idiotic, Will. It’s like you stuck a knife in the open wound and twisted it around, deepening the wound even more, just by apologizing for it.”

Will drops his gaze to his lap, knitting his fingers together. Cecil puts a hand on Will’s shoulder and squeezes it gently. Will doesn’t know what to make of it; he steals a glance. Cecil’s hand then drops from his shoulder, smiling sympathetically, “And while I commend the fact that you actually apologized and tried to clear the whole thing up, it probably would have been best to leave the conversation at awkward small talk first. Unintentional, I know. I get that. But you have to admit, it might not have been the best thing to do. For all we know, the dude just wanted to find his soulmate and didn’t necessarily want to immediately hear all that .”

Wow, Cecil’s words did a great job of making Will feel bad.

At the time, Will had wanted to just explain himself and how he acted. He sometimes has a terrible habit of speaking first without thinking, and unfortunately, it happened twice in a row towards his soulmate, out of all people. 

Will sighs, “Now I feel terrible.”

“Nah, it’s fine.” Cecil reaches over and pats Will’s arm in a comforting gesture. “We all have our stupid moments.”

Will’s frown deepens as he looks at Cecil, a sudden realization hitting him. “Does this mean I shouldn’t contact him anytime soon?”

“Give it a few days. You told the guy you wanted to be friends and maybe he hadn’t heard it, but maybe he did. You still gotta follow up on what you said, kiddo.”

“Or I might look like even more of an asshole than I already do.”

“Exactly.” Cecil nods. Will sighs again and props up his elbows on knees, putting his head in his hands. The weight on the bed beside him is lifted, and a hand pats Will’s curls. 

Nico di Angelo definitely didn't feel like the type to easily befriend or approach people first, so the fact that he was the one who approached Will and told him that he thinks Will is his soulmate must be something huge for him. And Will had acted like an idiot for both times he'd faced Nico. Will doesn't know Nico all that well yet - they're still technically strangers; neighbors who just know that they're probably each other's soulmates - but Will thinks that Nico deserves to be treated better than Will has been treating him so far.

It takes a while before Will finally raises his head, and it's long after Cecil had stopped running his fingers through Will's curls.

Right before Cecil had left Will alone, he had squeezed Will's shoulder and murmured, “It’s okay, Will. We’re all idiots who make mistakes sometimes. As long as we don't make the same mistakes again, right?”

It doesn't really comfort Will.


End file.
